Feeding Time At The Zoo

Note to self:
- Fed indoor and outdoor plants.
- Rose stems are still sprouting but no roots. Should I bother trying rooting powder?
- Fed orchids. Epidendrum cuttings are rooting fast now they are on a sunny windowsill. They were straggling in too much shade earlier.

Marchantiophyta

"Who am I, that life disappoints me? I am embarrassed by the question."

-Jim Harrison's The English Major.

Sometimes the job and the cubicle and this city all seem so very gray.

A short walk with your best friend, who lets you borrow his camera,

and waits for you in the drainage ditch while you take pictures of elegant Marchantiophyta can do wonders for the soul.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marchantiophyta

The Alocasia Returns

Who knew? I thought this guy died a miserable death last year. I filled up the apparently vacated pot with New Guinea Impatiens. The impatiens are now long gone (despite my vain hopes to keep them alive through the winter), and the alocasia grew back in his former place. This, I would not have expected.

I've included some closeups of the leaves. The venation is really startling, especially from the back.

Valentines Bouquet Moves In

Valentine's day brought a deluge of beautiful long stemmed red and white roses to my door, which overflowed my two vases, and spilled over into several jam jars around the apartment. After a few days I noticed that the roses nearer the windows were beginning to sprout.

After two weeks of glorifying in an orgy of roses, I decided it was time to dead head them. I left about half on a sunny window sill, and the other half I stuck in some plant pots with some hatchling sweet peas on the balcony (if the roses die, I figure the sweet peas need something to climb on).

I'm not giving these roses high odds. Everything I've read suggests that the roses should have been treat as cuttings from day 1 if I wanted them to live. Well, they have a chance. If they thrive, I will make them some space on the balcony. At two weeks, there are no roots.

Trash Heap Phalaenopsis Rescue Blooms

This little guy we picked up on top of a trash heap (which only involved some minor tire squealing once we spotted it), has finally bloomed after a whole year of recovery.

From the bloom, I'm guessing its a Phal San Luca.

I picked it up out of the trash heap from a newly-sold house that had stood empty on our block for the last 4 months. My reconstruction is that the agent bought a few plants to spruce up the interior and then they never got watered while the agent was showing the place.

The phal had a lot going for it when I found it. The leaves were parched and a little burned but the roots, even though in standing water when I found them, were healthy looking and had not started to rot. I don't think they had been in water for long. When I got home I dried him off and put him in with the other orchids. He was soon guzzling a lot of fertilizer and making roots.

[ April 4th. Update,
in full bloom.]